Mayan Mountains
By Merz
Encountering La Mujer Vieja, and her art

I spotted my mother's head above the heaving ocean of humanity that 
crammed the marketplace.  She appeared to be in serious discussion 
with someone.  I started wading in her direction in hopes of 
preventing her from making a foolish purchase or being cheated by one 
of these dirty little peddlers.  I was fresh from a dirty little bar 
that didn't care how old a person was so long as he had the pesos for 
a couple shots of tequila, and now I had to make a showing before 
Mother noticed I had wandered off.  

Mother started a small art gallery after my father died when I was in 
high school.  She sometimes manages to break even, but sometimes it 
seems like she's trying to waste my inheritance by throwing money at 
any artist with a good story to justify truly ugly creations they 
want her to sell.  We were visiting Central America on my spring 
break from my sophomore year because she thought carrying more folk-
art sorts of things in the gallery would be a shrewd move. I jumped 
at the chance to go where the drinking was cheap and easy and because 
I wanted to make sure she didn't go completely crazy with her 
checkbook. I had even taken a class on art appreciation winter term 
in order to protect my future against my mother's whims.

I broke through the line of dark people surrounding her and banged 
painfully into a hard object.  My entrance was more a stagger than 
the dramatic arrival of a rescuer.  I looked around to see who or 
what had hit me with such bruising force but encountered only the 
quizzical black eyes of a stout woman in a costume that looked like 
it had been stitched from feed sacks and then dyed gaudy colors.  It 
took a moment to realize this was her version of a traditional Mayan 
priest's robes that ended at her knees.  Under the top garment an 
indiscreet amount of broad, brown chest was exposed down to the tops 
of breasts above a thin cotton shirt.  Her head was spherical sitting 
atop a thick neck, her mouth a thin gash that looked twice as wide as 
it should.  I couldn't guess at an age because while her skin was 
lined, they were shallow creases across tight skin in her forehead 
and around her eyes.

After returning my examination, her face suddenly split in a wide, 
amused smile.  She needed such a wide mouth to contain the large, 
even teeth she flashed at me.  "You mus' be the scholar, the expert.  
You and me, we'll help the Senora buy some good art, won' we?"

The pieces she was showing were rather intriguing.  They were various 
sizes of some sort of hard sedimentary rock with bands of lighter and 
darker colors fused together.  Some of the pieces had been carved so 
the sides showed scenes or figures that took advantage of the 
different colors.  Others had carved figures or symbols into the 
horizontal surface so the different color layers highlighted the 
carvings pretty dramatically.  I guessed I had banged into a piece 
Mother had just handed back, a slab about a foot wide by two feet 
long and six inches thick.  It looked smoothed by age and might have 
been quite old, and the symbols cut into it looked like Mayan symbols 
I had seen in books. 

"If the altar piece is too much, maybe you like a piece from the 
thirties, traditional but looks modern."  The woman boosted the piece 
above her head to set on an upper shelf that groaned under the load.  
The sleeves of the robe fell to her elbows, revealing thick, muscular 
forearms.  

While the woman's back was turned Mother nudged me and gestured at 
them.  "Bet you'd like to do a little worshipping at those altars, 
wouldn't you," she whispered.  Mother frequently teased me about my 
taste for female muscle, she just didn't understand that I'm the one 
who expects to receive worship from the muscle-bound babes because 
they can't get the attention they want from most guys.  I figure they 
need me more than I need them and thought this case would be no 
different.

"Careful with this, is heavy."  From a lower shelf the woman hefted 
up a stone about the size of a smoothly rounded concrete block and 
offered it to Mother.  I got a nice look at the woman's lower leg 
when she bent for the block and had to admit it looked pretty solid 
and even shapely.  Mother's own athletic arms swelled as she accepted 
the weight, reminding me yet again that I still had never beaten her 
at either tennis or golf.  I glanced down at the brown legs again and 
tried to guess how far they measured around.

"I can't believe how dense this stone is.  But what a wonderful 
design!"  She turned the piece in her hands, studying the patterns of 
the light and dark halves where they mingled.  Her eyes twinkled as 
she asked, "Is this as naughty as I think it is?"

The shop keeper put her dark hand on my mother's arm.  "Naughty?  
Hah!  We Maya know two coming together as one is just part of our 
nature, it's our culture.  You study our art around the Mayan 
mountains long enough and you will understand.  Not many Gringas can 
handle a stone this size like you do.  Maybe I should find a strong 
young boy so you can study our culture that way."  She squeezed 
Mother's arm in a manner I found much too familiar.  "You feel like 
you have Mayan blood in your muscles so he better be strong, Senora.  
And I will tutor your boy."  She shot a wink at me and I was 
surprised that it just made Mother smile wider as she visibly tensed 
the arm the woman was appraising.

"Look at this, Mathew.  It's so smooth it hardly seems carved at all, 
and I love how erotic it is when you realize what's going on."  

She offered the big rock to me.  It must have weighed two or three 
times what I expected because I felt it slip right through my hands.  
I had an instant of horror that it would shatter or else do serious 
damage when it hit the floor, but the native got her hand under it 
quicker than I could react and she caught the thing.  "Careful, 
expert.  Don' want you to get hurt," she mocked me.  

As I again reached to take the thing, Mother repaid the woman's 
rudeness by putting her own hands around her thick upper arm.  "Oh, 
my!  Talk about making it look easy, you lifted it one handed!  Maybe 
you better pick on someone your own size instead of my poor child 
when I meet this strong young man you mentioned.  Were these robes 
worn during worship ceremonies?"

"Depends what you worshipping.  Maybe start out in the robes but lose 
them by the end."

The rock was incredibly heavy for its size.  The two colors in the 
stone were interesting at first as I looked at how they were folded 
together, and then I realized the way they mingled looked exactly 
like an abstract sculpture of two people getting it on.

Embarrassed, I looked from one woman to the other, unable to say 
anything while the two of them seemed to be having a private wordless 
conversation.  Finally the Indian woman turned to take the load from 
my hands and smoothly return it to the shelf.

"Don' worry, Mama.  I won' make love with your son until we see each 
other three times.  I promise you, as one mother to another."

"Don't you have a daughter who should be romancing him?  Do you think 
he is experienced enough for you?  Perhaps you know the phrase, 
robbing the cradle."  Just because she knew it pissed me off she ran 
her fingers through my hair as she said this to a complete stranger.

"Hah!  I have two daughters.  They are like panthers.  They have 
always lived in the mountains and are wild things.  No, your boy 
would not be safe with either of them until they are trained in city 
ways.  Maybe someone can teach them gentleness, but now they can only 
make love to those big peasant boys they find, or the soldiers who 
come through our village, but next year I try to teach them about 
city boys."  She smiled broadly at Mother, a bit of gold flashing 
from one of her large square teeth.  "You have lived in cities and 
understand gentleness, don' you?"  She crossed her arms in a way that 
lifted her breasts and increased the cleavage her costume was 
showing, and at the same time again showed how thickly muscled her 
forearms were.  "Your boy will be safer with me than with my 
daughters.  I know how to be gentle around the cradle and am wise in 
the ways of worship."

I couldn't believe my own mother was putting her arm across an 
Indian's broad shoulders and exchanging big smiles with her as they 
bantered about me screwing the old lady.  My face must have been beet 
red.  The power of suggestion might have been at work at the same 
time because my eyes kept coming back to the that expanse of bare 
chest above her shirt, and the stirring beneath the taut skin of her 
arms had me pretty aroused as well.  If she was talking about 
worshiping me on such short acquaintance, I might be persuadable.   

With little further attention paid to me or my opinions on anything 
the two women talked their way through the grubby woman's wares.  I 
was mentally adding up the damage to Mother's checkbook but had to 
admit that everything she agreed to purchase was attractive or 
interesting in various ways.

 "You wan' see how our people carve the new ones, or see the Mayan 
originals, you come to me in my village there at the end of the 
mountain road.  You know the way, I think.  Maybe you come visit 
tomorrow and give my daughters a taste of civilization.  I think you 
could do that, Senora.  I am Maria, but everyone is named Maria.  You 
ask for La Mujer Vieja and they tell you how to find me.  Mujer 
Vieja."  The second time she said it she shifted her gaze from Mother 
to lock eyes with me.  Her eyes looked eternally dark and I was left 
clueless as to her actual age.  She rubbed her shoulder against 
Mother. "Maybe you be interested in Mayan mountains.  I give you a 
good tour."

Mother just smiled and winked at me.  Mujer Vieja would usually mean 
'old woman', but probably referred to her interest in Mayan artifacts 
and costumes and all.  She was clearly young enough to be interested 
in me.

 "Okay, you wan' ship these home so you need crates.  I know a man in 
town who will pack everything just right.  Give that man, Ruben, this 
list of sizes today and he will have crates made to ship what you buy 
to the north.   I will bring the stones tomorrow.  Jus' remember, I 
said I would have to see him three times before we make love, and 
that be number two."  She gave me a nudge and flashed her big teeth 
again.  Mother just laughed.  When her shoulder banged against me I 
wondered if it was her hard body I had bruised myself against when I 
came onto this scene instead of her rock carving.  I started thinking 
about our next meeting with more interest than I had before.

Mother left our hotel early the next morning before I was up, maybe 
about dawn, leaving me to see that the shipping arrangements came 
together while she roamed around spending more money or whatever she 
was up to.  I fumed at the so called carpenter as he wasted time 
while tacking together the last boxes we had ordered.  Old Ruben 
worked so slowly that I slipped away for a quick tequila about 11:00 
and came back to find the job finished.  About noon Maria climbed 
down from a battered truck and marched into the shop.  Instead of 
yesterday's gaudy costume she wore dirt colored shirt and pants that 
again looked like recycled sacks.  She put her fists on her hips and 
threw back her shoulders as she surveyed the scene while exchanging 
rapid comments with the old guy.  My Spanish is pretty good, but I 
couldn't follow anything they were saying.  She seemed to be getting 
more respect out of him than I had managed all morning, though.  

She was capturing more of my attention as well.  Her posture 
exaggerated the width of her shoulders and the prominence of the 
breasts that were jutting out at me under her shirt.  I fought to 
stay calm as I found myself admiring the fact that her belted waist 
was a good deal trimmer than her robes had suggested in the market 
place the previous day.  With her shirt sleeves rolled up to her 
elbows she was seducing me with her powerful forearms again and my 
guess of her age decreased, and it seemed like her clothes were 
cleaner than on the previous day. Maybe she was dressing up for me. 

At a final comment from the workman she barked out a short laugh.  
"Says in spite of all your help we can load the boxes any time.  Says 
it go quicker if you visit the cantina an hour earlier.  Hope you 
have a strong back.  I'll get things off the truck and you two put in 
the boxes."  She dropped the tailgate of the truck and I gave the 
useless old man a nasty look.

From the first block Maria handed over I could see how the job was 
going to go.  I must have been doing all the heavy lifting on our end 
because every time she handed one across it about broke my back.  The 
stone those carvers were working on up in the hills was unbelievably 
dense and heavy.  Ruben the carpenter put on a good show of looking 
like he was taking half the weight of each load as we struggled to 
keep up with her lifting, but there was no way.  

She saved the biggest for last, a gorgeous piece that cut what looked 
like traditional Mayan figures through three color bands in the rock 
with a glowing red layer at the bottom of each glyph. Very cool, I 
thought.  Ought to bring a good price.  But it was about four feet 
long, a foot wide and a foot deep.  As she slid it to the edge of the 
bed I knew it had to weigh a ton and that the old man wasn't going to 
contribute much.  Sure enough, Maria put him and me at one end while 
she took the other herself, so she realized it was a two person job 
with him just putting on a show.  

After we eased it into place on top of a layer of wood shavings 
inside the crate we stood up and straightened our aching backs.  At 
least mine was aching from the strain and my partner went through the 
same motions while Maria looked on impassively.  Maybe she hadn't 
been doing that much work either and it was all on me, but at least 
she had worked up enough sweat to dampen her shirt so it clung more 
provocatively to her breasts.  I decided I'd make a move on her to 
see if she was attractive enough to go any farther.

The two of them started exchanging compliments for their labor, 
ignoring my contribution.  First she gave him a pat on the back and 
one of her big smiles.  Then he gave her shoulder a good whack and a 
squeeze, and he made some laughing comment in what I took to be the 
local dialect.  Another exchange of laughing comments and the old 
fool looked at me and did a pantomime of flexing his arms, which 
cracked them both up.  Finally he gave her a big hug and again copped 
a squeeze of her shoulders and then her ass.  With a laugh he turned 
to me and said in heavily accented English, "Mujer Vieja, nino!  You 
be careful around Mayan mountains," before turning back to his shop 
to close up the crates.

"You must have had quite a crew loading the truck if they were 
anything like that old fool.  He must be eighty."

She gave me a curious look.  "Close to eighty.  Amazing how strong he 
stays, isn't it?  Having him, we unloaded in the same time it took to 
load this morning, when I was fresher."

"Wait a minute.  How many of you loaded all those rocks into the 
truck?  And don't pretend he was doing half the lifting here.  You 
don't think that old guy was working as hard as I was?"

She snorted out a little chuckle.  "No, Ruben wasn't working as hard, 
but he was lifting more, school boy.  He is a workman still, and his 
back is strong.  And you mus' know by now that I had one helper to 
load the truck.  A good strong one who lifted the same stones the two 
of you did.  You'll see what it takes, jus' like you been wanting.  
Work is done.  I like to swim to cool off before I go back to the 
mountains.  Lez go.   I don' get to the ocean very often, and I 
brought my suit so I can swim with the tourists.  Good to make the 
most of the trip."  She didn't wait for my agreement, she just turned 
toward the waves that beckoned from a couple blocks away. 

Her walk had the rolling character of a sailor and looked a little 
odd from behind.  She led the way across the sand to a vacant spot 
among the sunbathers where she stepped out of her huaraches.  I 
quickly pulled off my shirt and kicked off my sneakers and waited to 
see what her next move was going to be.

Maria gave me a quick up and down glance, then untied her belt to let 
her pants drop and quickly undid her shirt.  Her black two-piece suit 
was modest by most standards, but her insane physique was so amazing 
she wouldn't have gotten more attention if she were standing nude in 
church.  Her upper arms had to be twenty inches around, the biggest 
I've ever seen on a woman, and crawling with thick veins.  On top of 
her shoulders were trapezius muscles as big as my fists.  Thighs like 
tree trunks made that wide-stanced walk necessary, and her abs looked 
like a weathered stone wall.  I realized my mouth was hanging open 
and tore my eyes away, only to realize all the American tourists on 
the beach were staring just as hard as I had been.

She led the way as we waded into the surf, holding my hand and 
drawing me along behind her.  I stopped as the cool water rose 
scrotum-high and I drew a few breaths to prepare myself for the next 
steps.  The water wasn't really cold, but it had just enough chill to 
catch my attention when it reached my privates.   Maria stopped and 
looked back at me in amusement and I again marveled at the thickness 
and power of the arm that tethered me to her.  I was distracted 
enough that I didn't see the sneaker wave that broke over her 
shoulders a moment later and knocked me off my feet when it slammed 
into my chest.  For an instant I felt myself being swept toward the 
shore, but then a shock through my shoulder stopped me cold.  The 
wave hadn't budged Maria, and she had kept hold of my hand so I was 
jerked to a halt as the wave swept shoreward. I flopped like a fish 
on a line.  I fell choking to my knees as the salt water streamed 
past me to the beach.  She grinned with her whole, wide mouth as she 
helped me to regain my feet but the out flowing water again caught me 
by surprise and I tumbled forward and slammed against her.  

Neither the force of the water nor my full weight piling into her 
budged her muscular body an inch.  My chest smacked against her round 
shoulder.  The force knocked my wind out and I folded against her.  I 
groped her solid pec and yielding breast before she shrugged me off 
so my weight landed completely on her right arm.  She held me there 
showing no sign of strain or surprise, with just a hint of amusement 
tugging the corners of her wide mouth.

I started to stumble in the moving surf again so she jerked me close 
against her hard body, face to face.  It seemed like one or the other 
of us was about to go for the kiss that this close contact demanded, 
but again she shrugged me off and I was able to stand upright.  She 
shook the long black hair off her shoulder, then turned in time to 
meet the next wave head on and dive under it.  Once more I was caught 
unprepared and this one knocked me down and rolled me a ways toward 
the beach.

After sputtering back to my feet I watched her play in the surf for a 
while.  She wasn't much of a swimmer, using a dog paddle or 
occasionally splashing a few stokes of her powerful arms in a crawl.  
Mostly she just waited for waves to break in front of her and then 
would dive under and bob around in the churning water behind the surf 
before moving closer to shore again to wait for the next one.  After 
a few minutes I waded back and lay on the sand to watch.

Maria played in the water for another fifteen or twenty minutes 
before marching across the hot sand to find me.  My perspective 
looking up made her seem like a colossus because of the incredible 
power packed in her thighs, body and arms.  Salt water ran down from 
her breasts and across the domes of her tight abdomen and onto her 
thick legs.  

"Feels good to cool off.  Should get to the ocean more often."  She 
bent and twisted so she could wring the water from her hair.  The 
movement caused her thick lats to spread and her biceps and forearms 
to bunch to incredible size.  "You wanna stay here some more or go 
in?"

On impulse I extended my hand to her for a boost up.  She rewarded me 
by curling her arm up as she half lifted me, deliberately flexing the 
biceps and showing she knew this was exactly what I had hoped for and 
how much it was turning me on.

"Why don't we go to my room for a quick drink," I offered.  "No 
reason to hurry off."

She got that amused look again.  "You ask like a boy asks a girl for 
a date. Not this time. I told you, we must meet three times before I 
make love with you, and that's what you are after."

She drew in a deep breath, expanding her chest and lifting the 
impressive breasts, then let it out slowly.  "I told you and I 
promised your mama that I would let you wait until the third time.  
She worries about you and made me promise again today."  

Her hand flicked out and grabbed my cock where it was standing 
straight up inside my shorts.  I gave a little squeal of surprise and 
instinctively jerked backward, but she held me firmly in place, the 
wide smile cutting across her face again.  With just a twitch of her 
thumb and forefinger she shot exquisite pain clear through me.  "You 
have the sharp tool like Ruben, but he has the skill to use it.  When 
he was young and came to me his strong back kept him safe with me, 
but now he needs skill as well.  You have much to learn before you 
meet me again if you want to stay safe."  Another pinch and she let 
me go.

"You?  And Ruben?"  I groped without success for a more polite 
Spanish word for fuck.  "But he's so . . ."

She massaged her impossibly thick biceps.  "Old?  He wasn't always 
old, you know.  As a young man all the senoritas threw themselves at 
him, and he was brave enough to throw himself at me.  You know now 
why I am Mujer Vieja."  Something in her eyes when they locked on 
mine made me think I was looking down tunnels that went back for 
centuries. 

"In the market you thought you were better than me because you are 
white and from the north.  With the truck you thought you could be as 
good as me because you are male and young."  Abruptly she grabbed my 
upper arm and gave it a squeeze, hard enough to shoot pain clear up 
into my shoulder.  "Your muscles are soft, not hard and strong like 
your mama's.  She could please me, just as she tamed my daughters 
after the two of us loaded the truck this morning. But you, you I 
would hurt without knowing or you would hurt yourself against me.  
Your mama thinks if you work for some months, maybe it would be 
safe."  

She shrugged and turned to walk away.  Pausing, she called back over 
her shoulder, "In October I will be in New York City to teach a class 
at Columbia.  You sign up and if you prove you are worthy there, 
where you live instead of in my country, maybe we make love.  Maybe I 
can be gentle enough not to break you.  First you must study with me 
the Evolution of Mayan Teleology.  I think your mama will be in the 
class.  You can compete with her in school and she will tell me which 
of you is strong enough to make love with me." 


With that she hit a flex that caused muscular explosions from her 
calves, through her hamstrings and glutes, up her back and out to the 
most massive pair of biceps I have ever seen.  She picked up her 
clothes, smiled over her shoulder and marched away.